KAILUA-KONA — Sometimes, hops can help out. ADVERTISING KAILUA-KONA — Sometimes, hops can help out. The Kona Brewers Festival, held this past March, is more than an opportunity for residents and visitors to experience different beers and taste different foods,
KAILUA-KONA — Sometimes, hops can help out.
The Kona Brewers Festival, held this past March, is more than an opportunity for residents and visitors to experience different beers and taste different foods, it also gave local nonprofits a chance to network, collaborate and walk away with some extra funds to support the programs that support their community.
This week, the festival announced this year’s event raised $100,000 for local programs, putting it across the $1 million-mark in total over the festival’s 22 years.
The event benefited more than 20 area nonprofit organizations that, in exchange for some volunteer time staffing the festival, each received some money to help support their programs and the work they do in the community.
“That’s the other part of the festival people don’t see,” said Kate Jacobson, executive director of the Kona Brewers Festival. “We’re really trying to create opportunities for the nonprofits to network with each other.”
Among those groups is Friends of NELHA, a nonprofit organization focused on science education to connect students, residents and visitors with tenants at the Hawaii Ocean Science and Technology park at Keahole.
Part of their work involves offering tours to schools groups, giving students a chance to learn about science and engineering research happening in their own backyard.
“The research and product development going on here at the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority campus is cutting edge, which greatly benefits, especially, the youth of Hawaii Island, and the rest of the state,” wrote Candee Ellsworth, executive director of Friends of NELHA, in the beneficiary application to the festival.
Plus, she said, jobs focused in STEM areas – science, technology, engineering and math – are on the rise in Hawaii and NELHA gives kids that chance to be exposed to these careers.
But, she said, with a kamaaina/student rate of $28 per person, that’s still higher than many classes can pay even though a tour of the area would benefit both students and educators.
Ellsworth said in an interview earlier this week that her organization received $5,000 from the festival, which allowed Friends of NELHA to offer 300 free tours to students.
Within weeks of receiving the grant money, Ellsworth said, educators took the group up on that offer, resulting in every one of those spots being booked.
“It’s nice to be able to provide students with what kind of careers are available for them,” Ellsworth told West Hawaii Today. “It also kind of opens doors for them, seeing themselves in that kind of career some day.”
Also benefiting this year was Peoples Advocacy for Trails Hawaii, aimed at promoting safe and publicly accessible trails, bikeways and pathways on the island.
For the past 11 years, PATH has organized the “Run for Hops,” a 5k run/walk and 10k run, which had 691 people at its last run.
“That was our largest event ever,” said Tina Clothier, PATH’s executive director.
Money raised through the run helps support PATH’s Bike Safety Education program for Hawaii Island.
The program puts on three-day bike safety programs for local fourth graders, teaching them everything from getting a good fit on their helmet to proper signaling and how to ride safely.
The program also gives each kid a helmet that is theirs to keep.
In the past, the Run for Hops has raised upward of $5,000, which goes toward the costs of the bike education program.
“It’s a crucial source of funding for our program,” Clothier said. “Without that kind of support, it would be difficult to teach Bike Ed in as many schools as we do and reach as many kids as we do.”
Ellsworth said she’d like to continue partnering with the festival, saying its focus on sustainability closely aligns with the goals of Friends of NELHA.
“I think it’s a vital event for our community and it’s doing great work,” she said.
The beneficiary application for next year’s event is already available.
This year will be the first the festival is working under their newly launched Ke Kai Ala Foundation, which is locally based and promotes environment, culture and youth. Previously, the festival was under the Oregon-based Bill Healy Foundation.
